A Cup of Coffee Ruined His Day and Some Cars

Some mornings, nothing seems to go right.

Jaime Flores grabbed an early morning cup of coffee Thursday on his way to work. He no sooner eased back into traffic in downtown Santa Ana than the giant-sized cup of steaming brew toppled into his lap.

Then the 33-year-old Santa Ana laborer’s foot hit the accelerator, not the brake. His 1975 Ford LTD shot through an intersection into a block planter and became airborne, landing on three cars at a used car lot on 1st Street at Broadway, Police Lt. Robert Chavez said.

“The carnage was incredible,” Crevier Motors general manager Michael Lake said in disbelief. “It was like a domino effect. First he landed on an ’84 BMW 318i, then he creamed a red ’84 Honda Prelude. That smashed into an ’85 Mitsubishi pickup.”

The good news, according to Lt. Chavez, is that neither Flores nor anyone else was injured. The bad news, according to Lake, is that damage to the cars and the planter was estimated at about $13,500--$10,000 of it to the “primo” BMW.

“And we just found out the guy has no insurance,” moaned Lake. “I can just imagine what this is going to do to our insurance.”

Flores, who could not be reached for comment Thursday, was cited by investigating officers for making an unsafe turn and not having a driver’s license in his possession.